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Overview

Although the blues is the most renowned form of early 20th century African-American music (other than jazz), it didn't dominate rural Black music to the extent that many listeners often assume. Black and White folk musics mingled extensively before the advent of recorded technology, and Black musicians often performed gospel, religious hymns, folk ballads, and fiddle tunes as well as what we now recognize as the blues. This compilation does a good job of illustrating the diverse ancestry of African-American music with 23 rare sides from the 1920s and 1930s, when records and mass media had yet to fully introduce elements that would standardize musical genres and approaches to some degree. Some of these performers would indeed become classified as blues artists (Mississippi John Hurt, Robert Wilkins, Henry Thomas). But most of these tracks are not explicitly rooted in blues forms, examples being B.F. Shelton's banjo ballad interpretation of "Pretty Polly," Taylor's Kentucky Boys' fiddle breakdown version of "Forked Deer," or the Seventh Day Adventist Choir's "On Jordan's Stormy Banks We Stand." Remastered from old 78s, this may be of more educational than entertainment value to most modern listeners, but it's well done, with extensive liner notes explaining the various forms of Black music preserved on the disc.

Appointed Mother of the Blues during her '20s heyday, singer Ma Rainey was one of
the best of the many classic female blues singers of the period. An inspiration to the Empress of the Blues, Bessie Smith, Rainey was a ...

Yazoo's Bottleneck Guitar (1928-1937) is a great collection of early recordings from slide guitarist Tampa
Red. The 14-track collection has a number of classic solo cuts from Tampa -- including You Gotta Reap What You Sow and Seminole Blues -- ...

With his high, eerie falsetto and haunting guitar tunings, Skip James sounds like no other
country blues player. Although his lyrics were generally drawn from the floating bag of clichés that showed up in countless blues songs, his atmospheric recordings, ...

This a marvelous little companion piece to Young Big Bill Broonzy (1928-35) on Yazoo. Broonzy's
ragtime guitar picking is textbook in its scope, and his vocals are as warm as can be. Dubbed from old 78s, the ultra high quality ...

I Ain't Gonna Be Worried No More compiles 23 songs Sleepy John Estes recorded between
1929 and 1941, capturing the bluesman at the height of his creative powers. Unlike many Delta bluesmen of his era, Estes worked with a full ...

As the most popular blues craftsman of the Mississippi Delta, Charley Patton had a resounding
influence on many of the musicians that passed through the region during the '20s and '30s. Following his initial session for Paramount in 1929, he ...

My Rough and Rowdy Ways, Vol. 2 features 23 songs from the '30s about badmen
and hellraisers, by artists ranging from legends like Uncle Dave Macon, Mississippi John Hurt, and Big Bill Broonzy to obscure music pioneers like George Reneau ...

Stop and Listen collects 20 tracks the Mississippi Sheiks recorded in the early '30s, gathering
together most of their best-known material (including Sitting on Top of the World), plus the previously unreleased Livin' in a Strain. These records are of ...